BREAKING: Audible announces Richard Armitage’s next audiobook

Audible Studios, a production arm of Audible.com, today announced the release of beloved stage and screen actor Richard Armitage’s next audiobook, quickly on the heels of audience favorites David Copperfield and The Turn of the Screw (2016). This impassioned performance by the star of Hannibal and The Hobbit will be available for download shortly.

In addition to his impressive television and film resume, Armitage is a renowned and polished audiobook narrator, nominated three times for Audie Awards: for Classic Love Poems (2015); for Hamlet, Prince of Denmark: A Novel (2014); and for Venetia (2011). Audible anticipates a further nomination for David Copperfield.

Asked about the new project, Reid Armbruster, Audible’s director of social media, stated, “We are pleased to be developing our relationship with Richard Armitage after the massive audience response to his audiobooks so far. It gives us particular pleasure to be able to supply Armitage’s fans with an audiobook version of a text that they assure us practically every week that they would be pleased to purchase.”

“The telephone book is likely to be tremendously popular, based on the the level of enthusiasm to hear Richard reading the phone book expressed in tweets,” said Audible EVP and publisher Beth Anderson. “With every recording, we strive to identify the perfect match of text and actor, and we think listeners will agree that Richard Armitage and the phone book is that ideal pairing. Fans of Richard’s television and film work are going to love spending time at the gym or in the car as he reads them the names and numbers of random people no one’s ever heard of. In particular, the long pages of Rodriguezes, Schmidts, Huangs and Johnsons should make for particularly exciting narration!”

Fans speculated that Armitage, well-known for the intensity with which he researches every role and project, would get particularly involved in this one.

“Given the fact that the phone book practically doesn’t exist anymore,” commented an under-employed former history professor and blogger in Wisconsin, “just assembling a reliable text to read that actually included the entire phone book in a list form might be a significant challenge. Or,” she continued, “he could just read it off the Internet.”

However, a picture circulating on social media seemed to support the possibility that Armitage had already completed the recording process for the book.

Richard Armitage records the telephone book in the audible.com studios. Or perhaps the script preparer confused the phone book with a Tommy Tutone song.

The entertainment press was eager to discover more about the new project. After a fruitless search in Berlin, our intrepid reporter located Richard Armitage on the summit of Cardón on Fuerteventura. “There’s no snow. No skiing. Why can’t we film this damn thing in Austria?” he was heard to be grumbling when she scrambled up the slope after him.

Sensing his impatience, the reporter asked him a burning question: “Given your interest in finding an individual voice for EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER in a cast of thousands in David Copperfield, will you also individualize all the names in the Manhattan white pages for Audible? Or will you go for the safer approach of a single voice for each family name?”

At first, Armitage did not answer. Then he opened his mouth and yelled:

April Fool!

Happy April Fools’ Day to Richard Armitage, audible.com, and all of Armitage’s fans.

I’m going to cross my fingers for the Armitage on Audible version of the 1040 tax booklet next year. I’d pay double to listen to him read It. I might even understand is me of the finer nuances of the math problems if he did. Just saying.

I have long waited for this particular announcement. So glad it is finally coming. At least we now know what his next project is. Will do wonders for his pale British teint (given that he won’t see the light of day for months, during recording).
😎

I’m glad the joke worked at least for some! The first 2 paras are closely modeled on actual Audible.com press releases — the only way to make this joke work was to bury the title of the “new” audiobook as long as possible.

One of the Tolkien bloggers got it really badly yesterday — published a report that WB and Jackson were planning to do another film based on the LOTR appendices or something. To the point that when I read it, I thought HE was April Fooling his readers — until about about four hours later, he published a second post saying that he’d deleted the earlier one. I felt bad for him, but that’s how April Fools works, you play on the target’s desire to believe something is true.

Too freaking funny. And dangerous to have a drink in hand when one gets to the photo down below! NOW I see why Audible didn’t include RA in their little prank (which is actually downloadable- I did it!). Who needs him to narrate the Encyclopedia Britannica when he’s already committed himself to the phone book?https://www.audible.com/mt/AF2016/?serial=&source_code=AUDOREM0325169GNU

I dunno, but it’d be nice to hear his voice giving me directions in my car on the navigator system… I might go in circles on purpose just to hear the reprimands that would have to be made on account of my ridiculous driving 🙂

Yeah, I’ve thought about that too… for some reason I picture that character a little shorter than Richard- maybe it’s the wolf references, and I think of a wolf as a stockier creature. I like Emily Blunt for the witch. And maybe Sean Connery (a younger one) for Matthew’s father.

Oh, I must really be beyond tired. You had me going for quite awhile, until the actual words “telephone book” hit me between the word “sucker” on my forehead! This year, I thought that the April Fool’s jokes were sparse…only to be graced with one here! And, an extra chuckle for the phone number. ..now I’ve got that one-hit-wonder stuck in my head! 😆😬

[…] kiss the vampire, however, will lose the level and must sit out for five minutes while listening to Armitage’s narration of the Manhattan phone directory before they can attempt to kiss the avatar […]

[…] but doubt now that I’ll ever be able to finish it.) I’m not in the group of people who’d pay to hear him read the phone book, and honestly, 2018 was rough on me just because there was so little visual output. I know there […]